


takeaway cups

by falloutmars



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, F/M, Meet-Cute, barista betty, writer jughead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-24 05:28:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21333001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falloutmars/pseuds/falloutmars
Summary: prompt: Person A is the barista at a coffee shop and always screws up Person B’s name on purpose.
Relationships: Betty Cooper & Jughead Jones, Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Comments: 12
Kudos: 110





	takeaway cups

“Latte for -“ 

“That’s mine,“ Jughead interrupts, not wanting the poor barista that he didn’t recognise to say his weird name. “Thank you.”

He picks up his cup from the counter and carries it over to his normal table in the dark corner. He sits down and takes his laptop out of his bag. 

As he flips the screen up to begin writing, the barista who made his drink walks over to him.

‘Hello my name is Betty’, as her name tag informs him, doesn’t clear tables like he expects. She starts talking to him.

“Hi, um, I’m sorry to bother you. I just noticed that your drink is in a takeaway cup. Was that my mistake? I’m sorry, I’m new here.” 

He can tell that she’s nervous from the way she rambles on and he instantly feels sorry for her. 

Giving her a small smile, he attempts to explain himself. 

“No, I asked for a takeout cup. It’s stupid really, I just prefer them to mugs. But don’t worry, I always recycle them.”

It’s a half truth. He does prefer them to porcelain. But he also enjoys seeing how people spell his name. No one ever expects to hear ‘Jughead’, so he gets some rather interesting and funny variations of potential names. He’ll never let anyone attempt to say it out loud though. Not with other people around. God, the embarrassment. 

“Phew, okay. Sorry for interrupting; enjoy your drink,” the barista says, nerves disappearing from her voice as she speaks. 

By the time Jughead goes to reply, she’s back behind the counter serving another customer. He turns back to his laptop and starts writing. 

A few minutes later, he picks up his cup to take a sip. He laughs to himself when he sees how Betty the Barista spelled his name.

_ Jughat_ . 

—

The following day, Jughead orders the same coffee from the same barista. As always, he interrupts her before she can say his name.

As he goes to collect his takeout cup, he decides to be nicer than he was yesterday - he still feels bad after their short conversation. 

“Thank you, Betty,” he says in a friendly voice. 

She looks up at up him, confusion on her face. Laughing, he points to her name badge. 

“You’re welcome,” she smiles.

“Have a great day.” 

He walks off over to his usual table, smile on his face after that interaction. As he sits down, he glances back over to the counter, where Betty is serving customers. In that moment, he can’t help but think how pretty she is. 

He pushes the thought away and picks up his cup to take a sip. Once again, she’s written  _Jughat_.  Shaking his head, he giggles to himself. 

— 

Jughead finds himself unable to go back to the coffee shop again until 2 days later. He’s disappointed and tries to tell himself that it’s because it’s a good place to write and definitely not because of the pretty barista that might not even be at work. 

When he does get the chance to return, she is in fact at work. Pleasantly surprised, he orders the same drink as always. She interrupts him this time, saying  takeaway cup, I remember  with a laugh. He doesn’t give her his name that day either, but he does see her scribbling on the side of his cup. 

He thanks her with a big smile, definitely not thinking about how  _ goddamn pretty _ she is. He walks over to the same table as always, smile still covering his face and plonks himself down to get to work. 

Words come easier some days more than others, he knows that, but recently, Jughead has been having an especially hard time getting anything out of his brain. The coffee shop environment helps him calm his thoughts and allows him to make some progress on his novel, though. But today, he’s feeling incredibly distracted. 

Glancing up from his empty Word document, his eyes land on Betty - the new barista he can’t seem to get out of his head. There’s just something about her that fascinates him. She’s beautiful, friendly and in the handful of times Jughead has been served by her, she’s good at making him laugh. 

He watches as she makes a drink for a customer. She does so in a way that makes it look easy and he wonders if she worked as a barista elsewhere before here. He makes a mental note to ask her when he gets the opportunity, when he’s brave enough to strike up a conversation that doesn’t consist of his drink order for the day. 

At one point, she catches him looking and flashes him a massive grin. He looks away embarrassed and gets back to work. 

Words flow more than they have in days and 10 minutes later, he has almost a whole page for the next chapter. There’s a new detective involved who may or may not be based off a certain blonde barista. Regardless, Jughead is happy with his progress so far. 

He picks up his cooled drink to take a well-deserved sip.  _Betty makes the best coffee_,  he thinks to himself.

As he places it back on the table, he notices her neat handwriting on the side of the red cup. 

_ Jughat_ . 

—

Over the weeks, Jughead visits what he has now renamed as Betty’s Cafe. More often than not, she is there working and greets him with a huge smile. They engage in polite conversation and get to know each other better and better every time. When it’s quieter, Betty spends her time talking to him and when she’s busy, Jughead does some of the best writing he’s done in years. 

No matter how many times she serves him, his cup always says, in her curly handwriting,  Jughat . He thinks she might be doing it on purpose, and makes a mental note to ask her about it next time.

Today, however, Betty is not at work and Jughead gets a mediocre coffee from a mildly unfriendly barista. He hoped she would be there to make him smile, maybe inspire him with his novel, but no. His shitty day has just gotten worse. 

He takes the coffee without even as much as a smile and turns to the direction of his usual table. Of course, someone is already occupying it. Of course that’d happen to him today. 

Finding a different table, he sits down and takes out his laptop. No words fill his page like he’d hoped. He lacks inspiration, and the coffee shop environment is decidedly not helping like it used to. 

He picks up his coffee with a sigh. This time, the cup doesn’t even have an attempt at writing his name. 

He hates to admit it, but he misses Betty. He misses her smile and friendly conversation and even the way she spells his shitty name. 

He thinks that he needs to distance himself from her. They’ve only had a few weeks of regular conversation, so maybe he shouldn’t feel like this. 

Packing up his laptop and leaving the mostly full cup behind, Jughead heads out for the day, having made no progress with his writing. All he achieved was realising he should stop visiting the coffee shop so regularly. 

He walks out the door for the last time for 2 weeks. 

—

A full 2 weeks of minimal writing later, Jughead’s last hope is revisiting Betty’s cafe. His editor is non-stop harassing him for the next chapter, but he is struggling to get anything done.

So back he goes.

He walks through the door to a relatively empty shop, a nice comparison to when he was last here. In the corner, his usual table is empty, with no one waiting for drinks, so he’s off to a good start.

Glancing over to the quiet counter, Betty stands grinning at him. 

“Jughead! Where have you been?” she said enthusiastically. 

“Hey...” he begins awkwardly. “Sorry, I, uh, I’ve been busy.”

“I missed my favourite customer.”

He grins, feeling at ease with her once again.

“Your usual?” she asks. 

“Yes, please.”

He pays and they engage in small talk while she makes his drink. As she finishes it, a group of people enter, so Jughead takes his drink with a smile and leaves her to get on with her job.

Sitting at his normal table, he spends 10 minutes allowing his hands to type everything his brain has somehow managed to come up with since he entered. He’s made good progress on his chapter already, so he’s glad he decided to come back.

(Deep down, Jughead knows his productivity is not down to the environment, but a certain blonde barista who inspires his words.)

He takes a sip of his coffee. It’s much better than the last one he had here, or any he’s had in the past 2 weeks. As he puts the cup down, he notices her familiar writing.

It says  _ Jughat_.

Wait. Earlier, Betty called him by his correct name. How come she has written it wrong?

_ Ah! She’s been doing it on purpose this whole time!  _ he finally realises, completely sure this time.

He looks up and sees her with no customers, absentmindedly cleaning the counter. 

“Hey, Betty?” he calls. She walks over to him, smiling.

“Everything alright?”

“Yeah, great, except...” He points to the name on his cup. “You’ve been doing this on purpose, haven’t you?”

He smiles at her, subconsciously touching his crown-shaped beanie. She smiles back sheepishly.

“It started accidentally, but I saw it make you laugh, so when you kept coming back, I kept doing it. I’m sorry.”

“No need to apologise. It does make me smile. I’ve only just realised that you’ve been doing it on purpose though.”

“Sorry, Jughead,” she grins. 

And with that, she’s gone back behind the counter to serve again.

He smiles to himself, thinking about Betty as he sips the remainder of his coffee. He decides that he really likes her, but he isn’t sure what to do about it, if anything. 

Sighing, he gets back to writing, hoping to make some more progress. 

Almost half an hour later, Betty interrupts him. He looks up and, instead of her usual green apron, she’s wearing a denim jacket and holding a bag and takeaway coffee cup.

“Hey, it’s the end of my shift now. I’d love to stay and chat but I have to be somewhere, but I got you this,” she says, putting the cup on his table.

“Thank you,” he beams, unable to hide his gleeful expression. 

“Hopefully see you soon!” She waves at him as she walks away and out the door.

Jughead is smiling once again as he picks up the cup she left for him.

_Jughat! Call me_,  it reads, with her number written alongside.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading, i hope you enjoyed!


End file.
